Ed Oswald

UPDATED Two former Hewlett-Packard executives, plus three others outside of the company were indicted with in California late Wednesday on four felony charges. The charges include using false pretenses to obtain confidential information from a public utility, unauthorized access to computer data, identity theft, and conspiracy.

"One of our state's most venerable corporate institutions lost its way as its board sought to find out who leaked confidential company information to the press," Attorney General Bill Lockyer said during a press conference. "In this misguided effort, people inside and outside HP violated privacy rights and broke state law."

Continue reading →

T-Mobile may announce its plans to transition to UMTS as early as Friday, according to press reports. The nation's fourth biggest wireless carrier was the big winner in the recent FCC wireless frequency auction, and it is believed that much of the frequency gains would be used for its 3G plans.

According to analysts, T-Mobile's UMTS would operate on the 1700 and 2100 MHz bands, much like CIngular's offering. These frequencies are different than those used in Europe for UMTS - meaning the phones would only work in the US until dual-mode handsets are produced.

Continue reading →

Fujitsu provided more guidance Wednesday on the specifics of its previously announced recall, saying that 287,000 Sony-manufactured batteries would be recalled due to short-circuit and overheating issues. The new recall brings the total defective battery count to 7.5 million.

Six companies including Fujitsu have so far issued recalls: Dell, Apple, Lenovo/IBM, and Toshiba.

Continue reading →

Microsoft said Wednesday that it plans to clamp down hard on piraters of its next-generation operating systems, crippling both Windows Vista and Windows Server "Longhorn" if users fail to activate their copies within 30 days.

While the restriction of operating system features has been around since the advent of Windows XP in 2001, the new program takes that process a step further. It would also make widely distributed volume-license product keys -- traditionally supplied to corporations -- harder to use.

Continue reading →

Sony can't catch a break, and now its highly anticipated PlayStation 3 is worrying investors. Shares of the company fell Tuesday after a financial analyst expressed concern over the console after it displayed some unstable behavior at the Tokyo Game Show.

Macquarie Equities analyst David Gibson wrote in a research note to clients that he watched the system operate erratically and said it required repeated resets. The PS3 was enclosed in a display case, but Gibson was not sure of the exact reason.

Continue reading →

For the past three quarters, Sirius has been making serious inroads into XM's lead in satellite radio, and this quarter was no exception. On Wednesday, both companies announced their quarterly subscriber adds, and the smaller company continued to beat its larger rival by a 2-to-1 margin.

It still appears that ten months after shock jock Howard Stern joined Sirius, the company continues to see a residual benefit from the high-profile personality. However, XM has shot back with talk show queen Oprah Winfrey, but her channel debuted late in the quarter.

Continue reading →

EchoStar scored a victory in court Tuesday, as a federal appeals court stayed the injunction that would have prevented it from selling digital video recorders to its customers. A jury had found the company guilty of infringing on TiVo's patents in April, and awarded TiVo $73 million.

The court had issued a permanent injunction that would have prevented EchoStar from manufacturing or selling digital video recorders. However, in mid-August the company won a temporary stay of the injunction pending a decision on whether the stay should be permanent.

Continue reading →

After failing to generate much interest in its A9.com search engine, Amazon confirmed Tuesday that it was removing search history and mapping features that differentiated it from competitors. In its place, a simplified front page that links to other search engines has appeared.

A9 now makes heavy use of Windows Live Search and Alexa, as well as links to some 400 other sources.

Continue reading →

Exploit code for a patched flaw in the Mac OS X operating system was discovered over the weekend, which allows an attacker to gain full system access through flaws in the core of the operating system. Apple provided a fix for the issue in a security update issued last week.

Researchers with Matasano Security, who are credited with discovering the flaw, said the malicious code appeared to be a zero-day exploit and may have been available on the Internet before Apple released its patch. Tuesday's news also highlights attackers' increasing focus on Mac OS X.

Continue reading →

Looking to take on Bluetooth, Nokia said Tuesday it was open-sourcing its "Wibree" wireless technology. According to the company, Wibree uses a fraction of the power of other radio solutions, and is easily integrated with Bluetooth.

Nokia says Wibree is the first open technology to allow connectivity between computers and cell phones and button-cell powered devices. This could include toys and watches, among other items. Similar technologies require too much energy to be used on low-power devices.

Continue reading →

Hewlett-Packard stood by its decision not to recall laptops that included batteries made by Sony late Monday, issuing a joint statement with the company saying there was no risk of overheating. The two said HP's laptop configurations prevented such an issue from occurring.

The beleaguered Japanese electronics manufacturer is at the center of a massive recall spanning at least five computer manufacturers and over seven million batteries. Dell was the first to announce a recall, and has since been followed by Apple, Lenovo/IBM, and Toshiba and Fujitsu.

Continue reading →

As expected, Microsoft said Tuesday it has appealed a July fine by the European Commission with the Court of First Instance, the European Union's second highest court. It accuses the EC of prolonging the case while the Redmond company attempted to comply with the ruling.

Microsoft vowed to appeal after the EC handed down the 280.5 million euro fine on July 12. Before that ruling, he regulatory body had never fined a company before for failure to comply with an earlier order.

Continue reading →

Noted DRM hacker Jon Johansen, known more commonly by the nickname "DVD Jon," has now figured out a way to reverse engineer Apple's FairPlay digital rights management technology. Johansen is now licensing his workaround to companies who want their media to play on Apple devices.

According to a report on technology web log GigaOM, Johansen along with partner Monique Farantzos have already approached Apple CEO Steve Jobs about their technology, although they did not provide specifics on their plans.

Continue reading →

McAfee took a full-page advertisement in Monday's Financial Times to level charges that Microsoft is locking security companies out of the Vista kernel in an attempt to "hamstring" them. McAfee says it is the first time that Microsoft has made such a move.

Security firms, such as McAfee and also Symantec, have complained Microsoft has locked down Vista to support its own entrant into the security space, Windows Live OneCare. However, neither company has filed antitrust complaints, and governments like the EU have taken no action as of yet.

Continue reading →

The EU applauded the United States government's moves to make the Internet's domain name organization independent Monday, but said it would monitor the process. On Friday, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) said it had signed a three-year extension with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

In the new agreement, ICANN is no longer required to file reports with the Commerce Department twice a year, or have its work dictated to by department officials. Several international governing bodies have criticized ICANN for being too close to the US Government.

Continue reading →